Various systems, such as pick-to-order systems, may be used to fulfill complex orders in inventory storage, warehouse, shipping, or other environments. In such systems, pods or other containers may include items required to fulfill one or more orders in an order queue, and may be manually or automatically directed to an operator station. In such systems, a respective tote corresponding to each order in the order queue may also be directed to the operator station. Once the proper pods and totes arrive, an operator at the operator station may remove items from the various pods, and may place a required number of items in the respective totes based on the quantities specified in each order. In order to maximize efficiency at such operator stations, and to minimize the amount of time and effort required for the operator to transfer the required items from the pods to the respective totes, it is typically desirable to synchronize the arrival timing and sequencing of totes at the operator station with the arrival of the various pods.
Although tote handling systems have been developed to facilitate the movement of totes to and from operator stations, and to control the arrival timing and sequencing of such totes, existing systems can be quite expensive due to the number and complexity of components (e.g., right-angle pop-up wheels, motors, etc.) required to provide such functionality. Additionally, due to the number and nature of such components, existing tote handling systems can be time-consuming to manufacture, and are often difficult to operate in order fulfillment environments.